(Page numbers given refer to Collected Poems: Derek Mahon [CP]: The Gallery Press, 1999)
Poem Title |
Original Publication |
CP Page no |
Ovid in Love |
Antarctica, Dublin: The Gallery Press, 1986 |
79-80 |
Length / Form Ovid’s elegiac couplets become octosyllabic rhyming couplets.
Allusion to Classical figure Jason, Corinna, Triton, Nereus’ nymphs
Allusion to Classical place Pelion
Relationship to Classical text Both are loose reworkings of the source text, the second being substantially abbreviated and with the more obscure mythological references removed. Mahon seems more keen to preserve levity of tone and the mocking, colloquial, urbane qualities of the original.
Close translation of words/phrases/excerpts Translations of Ovid’s Amores I, v and II, xi
Further Comment In the first poem Ovid’s Corinna, there described in the third person, becomes an anonymous ‘You’.